The area of Cambridge surrounding MIT is particularly dense with offices; research at MIT has spawned numerous electronics, software, and biomedical spinoffs and this climate has attracted Google and other companies that wish to feed off MIT's recent graduates. The office and student culture in the area has become very interested in lunch trucks. These are not your average roach coaches that pull up to an office building and have no competition. There are at least 4 area lunch trucks in the area, all dispatched by restaurants looking to compete with brick-and-mortar restaurants for the Kendall Square lunch crowd.

Enter Clover. Ayr Muir, a 2000 MIT graduate in Materials Science, came up with the idea to offer seasonal, fresh, local fast food (organic whenever possible) with the plan to open up a chain of restaurants. For some reason, he decided to first create a lunch truck. This is a truck like no other around.

First, the design and construction of the truck itself was documented on the Clover Food Lab blog, along with every step of financing and licensure. The truck is a diesel that uses waste vegetable oil for fuel, and the kitchen uses bottled propane for everything else. Every day, the menu and status of the truck is broadcast via Twitter. It seems as if everything is cooked inside the truck itself. It's equipped with a large convection oven, a deep fryer, a sink, and a juicer. All organic waste is composted. The truck even has loudspeakers for playing music to the people in line.

The Clover folks are also seriously into coffee, obsessively photographing their process of evaluating new bean vendors. Usually this is a photo of a long line of glasses each filled with a sample of a particular coffee.

The food served by the truck is entirely vegetarian, although they do not shy away from eggs or mayonnaise unless requested. Typically, the truck sends out its morning breakfast message once it's parked and ready to serve its oatmeal and fresh popovers. Four interesting sandwiches are concocted for lunch on most days, fitting the restaurant's motto: "Everything will be different tomorrow." Their fries are fresh-cut, cooked to order on the truck, and perfectly seasoned with fresh rosemary. They hand out free oranges or serve them freshly squeezed, along with hot or iced coffee and tea.

http://www.cloverfoodlab.com/